#FUTURES17 – Week 2 – Know Your Mentor!

We’re wrapping up week two in our FUTURES program and everyone is having a great time!

FUTURES are paired with two departmental associates who serve as a manager and a mentor during the duration of the summer. This week, join Megan Wurts, Delivery Analyst FUTURE, Erin Coots, Software Engineer FUTURE, Alex Beattie, Software Engineer FUTURE and Will Givens, Cloud Systems Engineer FUTURE, as they get to know their awesome managers and mentors better!

Megan interviews mentor Anh Vuong, Delivery Consultant:

Anh and Megan

Favorite part about working for Netsmart?

Anh`s favorite part about working for Netsmart is the fast pace it moves to keep her on her toes; she also enjoys the flexibility and how laid back environment it provides as well.

What do you do to impact the company?

Anh impacts the company with her productiveness holds herself accountable and when she does need help, she will ask for it. Anh will also ask for additional tasks to do if she finds herself at a standstill.

What do you do on a daily basis?

Anh’s daily tasks included weekly calls and checkups with clients to make sure everything is going accordingly. Anh will also work on the configuration on the PM side daily as well.

What is a large project you are working on right now?

The big project Anh is working on right now is the Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinic (CCBHC) which is an eight state billing project. The purpose of the CCBHC is to expand access to community-based mental health and addiction care services. As of right now, the federal government has approved the programs for eight states. If the project is successful there is a possibility that the program might expand to additional states.

What would you suggest to the current FUTURES?

Anh suggested that the FUTURES shadow in the office as well as onsite to see the different approaches being used to get a task done and find which one works best for you.

Erin interviews mentor Grace Aguilarleon, Software Engineer

Grace and Erin

What is your favorite part about working for Netsmart?

What I enjoy most about working at Netsmart are the constant challenges. This may sound like a negative, but it’s actually a testament to how great of a company Netsmart is! They are constantly trying to raise the bar when it comes to making our clients’ lives better. There is always a new project that tackles healthcare in an innovative and exciting way. Often, making innovation come to fruition requires a lot of extra work, research, and dedication, which I enjoy.

What do you do to impact the company?

In my year and a half at Netsmart, I think there are two main things I’ve done that have been able to impact the company positively. The first is running the Engineering FUTURES program. This year especially I put many months of planning into it and worked with Consulting as well to come up with a new format that I think will be beneficial for the company overall. If we can get our Engineering and Consulting FUTURES to have a more meaningful experience by having them collaborate, it will not only be great for them, but we’ll also have a great case study of how full-time Engineers and Consultants can work together more often as well.

The second thing is spreading the user experience (UX) word. We both take every opportunity we can to talk to engineers, product managers, executives, clients, pretty much everyone we can, about how impactful making our product’s easier to use is. In our field especially, we can really make a difference in people’s lives if we’re enabling our clients to provide better care. We spoke at last quarter’s Sync Week about it, we’ll be speaking at a product management day, we elaborate on it with every team we work with. I think that the awareness of UX and its importance has grown incredibly since the time Bree and I started.

What advice do you have for current Futures?

Don’t be afraid to explore outside of your teams. I came on as an myEvolv FUTURE, but as I learned more about UX, I realized it combined a lot of my passions. Anna Scheuler was an OrderConnect FUTURE my year and now works as a POV engineer and she loves it. If you hear/see something else that catches your eye, ask questions. Talk to people about it. Find out more. Even aside from changing your current role, learning more about Netsmart as a company will make the experience in general much more meaningful.

Alex interviews mentor Andrew Allen, Software Engineer

Alex and Andrew

As a Software Engineering FUTURE at Netsmart this summer, I’m excited to develop real-world software applications. I interviewed my mentor, Andrew Allen, from the Core Services Team (Services Team) about his experience at Netsmart. His favorite part about Netsmart is the size of the company and the diversity of events and opportunities available. The company is just the right size to be able to talk to anyone, regardless of their job title, for assistance, advice, or collaboration. Andrew works on many projects on a daily basis but his biggest impact is with the Cloudlifter tools. Cloudlifter facilitates the mass loading of client information into the data store. Manually entering this much data would be nearly impossible; this tool removes numerous hours of tedious work and labor which saves time and money.

Netsmart is constantly growing and because of that there’s always more projects to be tackled and new paths to explore. This creates diverse technical options involving working on developing internal tools, troubleshooting the software development kit, or assisting with certifications. For the FUTURES, Andrew gave two pieces of advice: learn as much as you can and never be afraid to ask questions. He reminded me that you’ll never know everything and that when you rely on each other, ask questions, and put your heads together, you will make systems that make Every Day Matters.

Steve has been with Netsmart for over three years, working primarily with our Cloud Network team. During his time working for Netsmart he’s enjoyed always having a new challenge. At the end of the day he can look back and see the direct impact that he’s made, contrary to his previous employments. Steve strives to ensure that our clients have the best experience in our hosting environment. This is done by not giving them a contracted solution but a solution unique to their needs. Steve is currently working on migrating our new self-hosted homecare clients into our data centers, facilitating a smooth transition. Steve’s suggestion to current FUTURES is to take advantage of the time you have with your team and learn as much as you can about your technology interest. He also encourages you to get out of your comfort zone and experience all the opportunities in front of you.